4th October 2006 “Your £12 thermals make you dance like a gorilla”.

[Freeflow]

Time for a proper night dive at Stoney, one which is actually dark. The plan was to meet Charles [Chas49] and Derek [Ratcliffe] for a couple of splashes, but as always plans change and Richard [Richie] substituted on dive one for Derek who was held up at work. I arrived bright and early and sat around bored for a while waiting for anyone to be arrested, but no one was. Kit together I sat in the pub for a bit knocking through my paperwork and waiting for the others, before returning to my car just in time for a car next to me to arrive containing children, which I am allergic to.

Charles arrived at 1700 and somehow managed to wedge his bus in the space next to me, and it’s a good job he’s a skinny chap or he wouldn’t have got out of the door. I was on a half full set of twin 12’s, Charles on a 15 and pony. Richard arrived in short order and parked up at the other end of the car park so as to not be associated with Charles and myself. He made us not want to be associated with him by walking around like an ape and grabbing his crotch explaining that his Argos themals were bunching up. One of the local robins was starting to get a bit lairy, and as none of us fancied our chances in a brawl, we decided it was time to get wet.

Charles decided to lose his dry pouch, requiring me to put them in the top pocket of his undersuit via the rear zip of his drysuit, an operation that required flexible wrists. All happy we wandered down to the water to get wet in the general direction of the pit. The bus stop is still closed, which is most annoying, and we got in at the far West end of the quay side. Richard and I dropped down and watched as Charles clambered down the bus stop legs like a reverse scaffolder. I offered him a couple of rocks, which he declined, and after making sure he was happy we dropped along the road to 20m.

Once at 20m we headed around to the right to pass the BOP and hit the shallow hydrobox and the rope to the pit. I was faffing about trying to put my gloves on under water and nearly missed the line, which Richard led the way down, with Charles the least experienced of us in the middle and yours truly bringing up the rear. At 32m and the top of the box we dropped over the side of the box, and I ventured inside, Charles deciding that discretion was the better part of wandering into a dark silty hole and stayed outside. I popped out of the top and dropped back down to Charles who appeared a bit narked. We ascended to the top of the box where Richard was waiting for us, and I then found that my cuff dump wasn’t dumping too well.

I wasn’t looking forwards to an arm full of water if I had to pull the wrist seal open, so I signalled to ascend while we were still close to the vertical rope on the box. Richard sent up his ‘cheating’ DSMB as Charles and I went up the rope, with me removing my gloves to ensure I could grip the smooth nylon of the rope cover if I needed to. Richard was doing a couple of deep stops as instructed by his VR3, and Charles was showing us all how bright his torch was until it was suggested that he turns it off. Dumping slowly I cruised upwards where I saw that Richard’s DSMB line had fouled the main line. I signalled him that there was an entanglement and managed to help him get free. My dump started behaving itself meaning I could relax at 6m and enjoy the stop. Swimming back as the light faded we traded a few sarcastic comments then hit the food hatch to get some grub in.

Derek arrived during our surface interval while Richard was making a fast getaway. He dragged all his kit down from the top car park and we kitted up for a second splash, this time to the helicopter and white van. Charles showed us his new toy, a battery powered glow stick that is blue-and does impressions of the TARDIS. After deploying cable ties all round and Derek poncing a spare computer as his one was sulking we fell in the water with varying degrees of grace. Charles lingered for a while on the surface again before deciding to join Derek and I in the depths and then we wandered vaguely in the direction of the drop off, at which point Charles’ torch decided we weren’t scared enough of the dark and did that rechargeable torch trick of ‘now you see it, now you don’t’. Luckily we had a spare torch floating around in the group so he could still find his way around. I had a play with just using my LED backup instead of the main one, and while I think that in clear water I would have been able to carry on with the dive, in the soup of Stoney it would have been used as a ‘get out of it’ rather than a ‘get on with it’ tool.

A quick circuit of the Wessex and a swim through the white van later saw me find a bent pipe which I was able to blow bubble through before practicing my golf swing. Ascending up the wall offered several chances to harass the resident crayfish before we headed to the cockpit during our deco stop and exited near the bus stop. One of the group did mention that he didn’t recognise the large, flat rock we swam over, then he realised that it was the cockpit.

Charles drained his leaky drysuit out while I showed off my rechargeable dekitting light and Derek went and dug out the 15L I had lent him last month. We then hit the pub for a swift cocktail [grapefruit and lemonade] before wandering off home.

DIVE DATA

Dive 1

34.7 m
37 min
RMV = 14.0

SI: 1:23

Dive 2

20.4 m
26 min
RMV = 12.1

[Richie]

Matalan sir, not Argos - I'm saving up for those

Thanks Charles and Dave - a nice dive - good viz practice for nextweek's liveaboard out of Marsa.
Looking forward to the next one.

[Freeflow]

Oh well, close enough, was I diplomatic enough about us nearly consigning Charles' torch to the pit?

Get the food problem sorted out?